Chapter 25
THE HUNTER exited the dimly lit tunnel to Whittier. He was finally back in the town of his birth.
Before even parking, he cruised the town’s handful of streets, looking for any car with Nevada tags or any other indication that it might be a rental. He found none. Even so, with the help of his father’s spirit, he could feel that the half-man, half-beast had been here recently.
He parked his car and got out.
Looking up at the tree-lined side of the mountain, he remembered shooting and skinning his first buck with his dad. The images filled his head like an old, scratchy film. He remembered the giant bear traps he had been too weak to pull back and to set. He remembered how his father told him that he too would one day be able to pull back the iron jaws on his own. And he remembered camping out in the forest for days at a time, learning how to live off the land.
He also recalled the most important lesson his father had ever taught him—to always be the hunter and never the prey.
That wisdom had shaped the rest of his life—for better or for worse.
You’re lucky I taught you that, boy. Always be the hunter. Unless you want to get killed.
The Hunter took one last look at the mountains surrounding the two sides of the town. He pulled the front of his Stetson low on his head, and then walked over to see about a room at the inn.
The Hunter entered the hotel and walked over to the manager standing behind the front desk.
“I need a room for a few nights,” he said in his low, garbled voice.
The man looked up and did a better job than most of pretending not to notice what was impossible to ignore—his face.
“I’m so very sorry,” the manager said. “But, we don’t have anything open at this time. May I suggest that Anchorage is not far away and has many fine establishments—”
The Hunter slapped down his American Express Black Diamond credit card and a crisp thousand-dollar bill on the counter.
He pointed to the card and then the money.
“This is for the room, however much it happens to cost. And this is for being so helpful.”
The manager’s eyes went wide, but his mouth was already in gear.
“I think we can find you accommodations for a few days, if you give me fifteen minutes to rearrange a few things. Will that be satisfactory?”
The Hunter grunted.
“We have a very nice bar just around the corner if you’d like to wait in there.”
The Hunter walked over with his bags in tow.
“You can leave those here with me, if you’d like, sir.”
The Hunter ignored the manager and kept walking.
After sipping on a club soda with lime for ten or so minutes, the hotel manager stepped into the bar.
“Your room is ready, sir. Please follow me.”
The Hunter downed the last of his club soda, then followed the hotel manager to an elevator where they rode up to the second floor.
After being showed his room and dropping his bags, the Hunter stopped by the diner for a meal. He asked for a table in the corner, and the waitress eagerly granted his request.
With a full stomach and a little daylight left, the Hunter decided to let his senses guide him as he walked around the very small town.
He looked toward the burned out barracks. According to the police reports, that was where his father had met his end. The official letter said it was a bear attack and that the only thing his will stipulated was that he be buried up in the woods behind The Towers, on the side of the mountain.
The Hunter had sent a check for a few hundred dollars, and supposedly, they buried his father up there on the side of the mountain, somewhere. After he took care of Walker and his woman, he’d think about stopping by to make sure the fucker was buried nice and deep.
At least you didn’t screw that part up. They buried me exactly where I told them to. And for the record, it wasn’t just any bear that got me. It was a big grizzly possessed by the same spirit that Walker carries around with him now. That bear wanted its revenge on me, and it finally got it.
The Hunter’s mind returned to the task at hand, and he noticed a set of footprints in the snow that seemed out of place amidst the others around it. They also seemed familiar.
He knelt down and studied them. Female. Size 7. Converse All-Stars—known as Chucks because of their affiliation with basketball legend, Chuck Taylor.
He was sure that they belonged to Zana. The distance between prints was right for her height, and their depth was right for her weight. He had followed her tracks enough back in Vegas to recognize them. And of course, right next to them, he saw the tracks from a pair of Men’s size 11 active wear dress shoes. Now there was no doubt in his mind that Walker and Zana had been here.
He had been in town for less than an hour, and he already had a trail to follow.
The prints were fresh, made earlier that day, and he followed them from the diner to one of the condos. It was impossible to tell which condo the tracks led to, since someone had shoveled the walkways. He thought about knocking on all of the doors and asking people if they had seen any strangers in town recently, but he decided against it. Given his mission, the fewer people with whom he had direct contact, the better. After a minute or so, he picked up their trail again, leaving the condos and crossing the road to The Towers.
As soon as he started walking toward The Towers, he could feel the spirit of his father resisting.
They’re not going to be there. Walker isn’t that stupid. We only care about where they went after they left here.
The Hunter smirked as he shrugged. He found their trail again as it was leaving The Towers, but their tracks ended where a set of tire tracks began. The light was starting to fade, but following the treads in the icy snow wasn’t difficult. He walked a quarter of a mile to where work was being done to extend the road, and hopefully Whittier, beyond the town’s current boundaries.
After passing the construction work, and following their trail another quarter of a mile, he saw that the car had turned off onto one of the home-made side roads that led up the mountain.
There was only one place they could go from there.
Up.
Given the fact that it was almost dark, and that he couldn’t find exit tracks, he assumed that Walker and his woman were staying up in the woods—either camping or renting one of the local cabins.
That made the Hunter wonder, once again, why Walker was coming back to this God-forsaken town in the first place.
He’s looking for that bitch that turned him into the aberration he is now. I told you that, already.
“But why?”
You know how men like Walker are. They’re always asking questions and trying to change their destiny.
“Since you were most likely the last one still alive from those days, why do you think Walker and the spirit wanted to kill me?”
My son, the innocent one.
The Hunter’s head erupted with cacophonous laughter.
I don’t know why the thing still wants you. But it does. You gotta kill Walker and the girl, and then you gotta put that animal’s spirit to rest. Or you’ll never get another moment of peace again.
“I can take care of Walker and the woman, but how am I supposed to put an animal’s spirit to rest?”
First you got to find the bones of the animals that my father—your grandfather—has been protecting all these years.”
“And then what? Give the animal a proper funeral?”
That ain’t how it works up here, with the Dena’ina. If you want to make sure an animal spirit moves along and stops fucking around with living, you gotta either burn its bones or drown them.
Chapter 26
“EXPLAIN TO ME again, how this shaman is going to find us?” Trent asked, as they pushed their way through the snow that was beginning to fall fast and wet. They’d been hiking for hours and hadn’t had a break yet.
“If I told you the real answer,” Christina
said, “it wouldn’t make any sense to you, and you wouldn’t believe me. This is more of an art than a scientific process.”
Trent grunted and kept walking.
During his first hike in Alaska, he’d checked over his shoulder every minute or so to make sure a bear wasn’t stalking him. Now he walked with almost no precaution at all regarding his surroundings.
At one point, when he stopped to take a drink of water from one of the bottles, he heard a distinct noise from behind them.
“Christina. Zana. Listen,” he said.
The two women halted in mid-step. He heard the definite sounds of footsteps crunching through the snow and coming closer.
Christina looked around and waved them over to a cluster of trees, the base of which was covered with green plants and tall grass covered in snow.
After they were hidden as best as possible, they remained silent and waited.
Within a few minutes, the footsteps were right on top of them. Trent saw branches sway and a leg emerge as the Sheriff stepped into view.
Christina stood up and held up a hand of greeting to the Sheriff.
“There you are,” the Sheriff said. “I’ve been looking all over for you. I thought maybe the Walker guy and his weirdo girlfriend got a hold of you.”
Trent and Zana stood up. Trent was laughing under his breath, but Zana had her arms crossed over her chest and didn’t look amused.
“Me and my weirdo girlfriend are right here, Sheriff.”
The Sheriff relaxed his gun hand that had instinctively gone to his holster.
“They’re my friends,” Christina said, as she stepped out of their hiding place, with Trent and Zana following close behind. “I caught up with them last night at the cabin, and we thought we’d take a hike today. Enjoy the land before it gets too cold.”
“Everyone in town thinks you’re missing,” the Sheriff said. “When I saw these two had flown the coop, I thought they were out here hiding your body.”
The Sheriff laughed.
Trent, Zana, and even Christina were silent.
“You didn’t even tell Fred where you were off to.”
“He’s my boss, but he doesn’t get to know everything I’m doing and everywhere I’m going.”
The Sheriff grunted and nodded.
“I suppose that’s true. But you three need to be careful out here. Latest report says there’s some real snow coming any day now. And there’s been some more bear sightings down on the edge of town. If they’re down there, they’re definitely up here.”
“Thanks for the advice, Sheriff,” Trent said. “Any idea how bad the snow’s supposed to get?”
“Might dump enough on the ground so it’d be hard for you to walk out of here without snow shoes. Hard to tell, really.”
Trent looked at Christina, who shrugged.
“I don’t expect we’ll be out much longer today,” Christina said, “before heading back to the cabin for the night.”
The Sheriff nodded.
“I’m just looking out for your safety. It’s my job, you know.”
Christina walked over to the lawman.
“Tell anyone down there who asks, that I’m fine. And would you mind letting Fred know I’ll be back in a few days to start picking up my shifts again?”
“I suppose I can do that, young lady,” the Sheriff said, slightly blushing. “Meanwhile, you three watch out, and don’t stay out much longer. I’m heading back now to get some hot coffee.”
The three of them watched as the Sheriff trudged his way through the trees, back down the mountain.
Christina kept watching until the Sheriff was gone from sight.
“He’s a good man,” she said. “He’s just watching out for me. But I don’t plan on heading back to the cabin any time soon. There’s still plenty of daylight left. Agreed?”
Trent repositioned the weight of his backpack.
“Agreed,” he said, “but I’m getting hungry, and I hear some water just past those trees. Might be a good place to have some lunch.”
The three of them walked along, and just as Trent had predicted, they shortly came across a clearing next to a slow moving stream. The water was about twenty yards across at its widest point, and the clearing was surrounded with different sized boulders and trees.
“This is perfect,” Trent said. “That tuna fish sandwich has been calling my name since breakfast.”
“I’m starting to get a little hungry, too,” Zana said.
“Sounds fine to me,” Christina said, as she sat down on the trunk of a large, fallen tree.
The food and drink were passed around from Trent’s pack, and they all settled into eating.
Between bites, Trent looked up and breathed in the cold, but crisp and clean mountain air—taking in the beauty that surrounded him.
Not for the first time, he was so lulled by the wonder of the place that he almost forgot the real reason he had returned to Whittier in the first place.
Halfway through his sandwich, Trent heard a loud huffing sound, and when the wind suddenly shifted direction, he could smell that unique combination of scents that he knew could only mean one thing—a bear was near.
He looked up from his eating just as a medium-sized black bear burst through the foliage on the other side of the stream. It stopped just above the water line and glared at the three of them.
Trent looked at the bear, curiously.
“Stand up slowly,” Christina said. “Raise your hands above your head, but don’t look at it directly in the eyes.”
Zana immediately did as Christina directed. Trent joined in almost casually—once again surprised at his lack of fear.
“Get closer together. We want to look as large as possible, so it thinks we’re one big damn creature that it doesn’t want to mess with.”
They bunched together closely and stretched their arms above their heads.
“I don’t think this is going to fool the bear,” Trent said calmly, but quietly. “It’s a common myth that they have bad eyesight, but actually they see just as well as we do during the day and much better than we do at night—”
The black bear cocked its head and growled, then lumbered into the water and started walking across the stream, headed straight for them.
Chapter 27
TRENT WATCHED as the black bear sloshed steadily across the stream. He felt a sudden calmness come over him—a confidence that the bear would not hurt him or the women.
He lowered his hands and took a step toward the advancing bear.
“Trent,” Christina said, “what are you doing?”
“I’m not really sure,” he said. “You two, just back away slowly. Trust me.”
Trent watched Christina and Zana disappear from his peripheral vision, then he refocused on the bear. Maybe the animal spirit inside him would take over and scare the bear away. Maybe it would somehow communicate with it. He wasn’t sure what it was going to do, but he could feel the spirit awakening inside of him.
Zana had suggested that the spirit might only take over when there was vengeance to be had. Trent hoped that wasn’t the case, as the black bear stopped in the middle of the stream and studied Trent with its brown eyes.
Suddenly, the bear charged at top speed, directly at Trent. Within seconds, the bear was across the stream.
The animal burst out of the water and stopped on the wet sand, only five feet away from Trent. It reared up on its hind legs, then dropped back down on all fours.
The charge had been a bluff, and Trent had shown the animal that he wasn’t afraid. This close, he could smell the bear’s wet fur and the stink of rotten fish, and he could see every detail in its coarse black hair.
Trent’s usually keen sense of time disappeared, and he was not sure how long he and the bear stood in a stalemate before the bear sniffed the air around Trent and reared up on its hind legs in one final show of dominance.
Trent remained motionless as the bear snorted, making demonic-looking white puffs in the air aro
und its nostrils, before it plopped back down, turned around, and began trudging across the stream to the opposite bank.
Trent allowed himself to breathe again as the reality of what had just happened began to sink in. His spirit had not come to his rescue—at least not overtly. It had not given him animal strength or spoken to the black bear in growls and grunts that only animals would understand.
But the bear had sensed something in Trent that gave it pause and made it retreat, and because of that, Trent was both amazed and thankful.
When he turned around, he saw Zana and Christina both running toward him. They took him by his arms and guided him to sit down on the log. It was then Trent realized that he was shaking. Not from fear, but from adrenaline.
“That was amazing,” Zana said as Christina squeezed his shoulder.
“She’s right,” Christina said. “You stood your ground and growled in that bear’s face like no human I’ve ever heard before.”
Trent looked up at Christina—unsure of what she had just said.
“Did you say that I growled at that bear?”
Christina nodded.
“You don’t remember doing that?”
“This is just like back at the campground,” Zana said.
“What happened at the campground?” Christina asked.
“I think I was possessed—that I turned—without even knowing it.”
Back in Vegas, he had at least been able to watch what the spirit was making him do. That was bad enough, but being so out of control that he couldn’t even remember what he had done scared him more than anything else.
“How about we finish our lunch and keep moving, if you’re up for it,” Zana said, wrapping her arm around him.
He looked at the half-eaten sandwich on the ground.
“I’m not that hungry,” Trent said, staring blankly in front of him. “I want to find the shaman as fast as possible so I can get rid of this thing.”
Christina nodded, but Zana looked at him as if he were crazy, before turning away.
He knew she viewed his connection with the spirit as a gift—a gift she would not have given away if she had possessed it. But Trent wanted it gone, and that was exactly what he intended on achieving.
The Whittier Trilogy Page 43